I’m sad to say I was not so impressed by the re-release of Running Wild by J.G. Ballard. The quiet suburb of Pangbourne wakes up one morning to find all the adults murdered and the children missing. What happened? How did it happen? I’m afraid it turns out to be all too obvious, with no surprises or unique revelations. And even the inevitability of it all is not used as an element of the story.

Maybe the way it is laid out like a case study is meant to have a desired effect, like Gray’s Anatomy: cold, detached, alienating, but, if that is what the writer was aiming for, I’m sorry, it didn’t work for me.